Crazy
by Louise24601
Summary: When the Tenth Doctor and Rose land in the middle of a jungle, they're far from expecting they're about to get mixed up in a revolution, and that it will be the ideal time to face the feelings they've been hiding from each other... and from themselves. Ten/Rose. Rated T for sexual situations and cursing.
1. Chapter 1

**AN** : before we get started, I am no expert on the _Doctor Who_ timeline, so I'll be using dates that may have been mentioned in the show and that may not correspond to what's taken place there. Most characters (apart from Rose and the doctor) will probably be original. It's my first multiple-chapter story in the fandom so I'm very excited to hear your reactions. Hope you'll enjoy.

…

Though Rose Tyler is by no means the first girl to enter the Tardis, she is the first who's managed to make it look _domestic_. There're clues scattered all over the place for him to pick up and admonish her if he cared to. A pink jacket left to hang on one of the levers of his brilliant time machine, as if it were a vulgar object – a chair, a coat rack. Books, notepads, eyeliner and lipstick. Why does she even need a purse if its content is always bound to be outside of it?

He's warned her about this. Everything here is important. Too important for her to leave her things hanging around. And yet, as he takes an honest, fatalistic look at his Tardis, strewn with girlish items, the doctor feels no desire to argue. He's had other companions who weren't so much awed by the time machine that they didn't dare to exist in it, but Rose is different – she's made a home there. Without asking for permission or forgiveness, but naturally, as if it was just the way of the world.

 _And so it is_ , he thinks to himself. _Maybe there's a time for everything_.

"Morning."

She surprises him, slithers out of her room. He didn't hear her get up. There's a cup of coffee in her hand, the very same cup he's made for himself just a few minutes ago, before wandering out of the kitchen to take a look at the main room. Now, of course, the coffee's ruined by all the milk and sugar she added in.

Rose smiles as he raises her eyes back to her face and takes an innocent sip, like nothing's righter than drinking his fresh coffee. Talking about things getting domestic.

"Is that mine?" As if the question needed asking.

"I'd taken it for granted you'd had yours already. I thought it might become a new habit, waking up to something hot to drink. How neat. In case it's giving you any ideas, I'm much more of a tea person."

"You're welcome."

"Hey, I deserve it. I've had a hard time sleeping tonight. Did we go into some sort of space storm or something?"

He can't argue there. It's been a rocky descent back to earth and he's been up most of the night himself getting them through in one piece.

"Yes, you could call it that." He answers cautiously. Watching her casually drink his coffee. Until recently, he thought he knew her tricks whenever she was up to something. It's only fair. He has years of experience, after all. But in the past few weeks – or is it months? – it feels like they've been playing a game that's a lot like the sort he's known with other companions before her, but with too great a variation for him to be completely sure. They've been descending into _normality_. Not just living adventures but sharing quieter moments – pleasant, adrenalin-free.

He watches her lips over the porcelain brim, enjoying the bitter-sugary foam.

The doctor decides he'll call this the Rose Tyler Paradox. It's part of the game, living mad experiences with him, following him to the end of the world and the apocalypse – that's what he sells, what he promises. And, yes, sometimes there'll be some flirt thrown in it, and he never fights against getting attached because that's the way of things – between loving none of his companions and loving them all, he's chosen the latter – but it's never anything like the un-thrilling joys of ordinary life.

He's not a boyfriend or a husband. He's the doctor. That's the package deal, that's the only shape he comes in.

But Rose, Rose is not just a companion. _And what's worse_ , he thinks, _she knows it_. A cool, cynical voice seeps in – _when she's gone, will you miss the extraordinary, the time travels, or will you miss this, the untidiness of her stuff scattered about, her stealing your coffee in the morning?_

Because she will go. The doctor's been around too long to be an idealist. However much he gives them, no matter how many heart-stopping sights he provides, in the end, they all leave him.

He's heard a few of them say _Forever_ before, but he alone knows, forever is lonely. They shouldn't speak words they don't understand.

So why does Rose smile at him sometimes as if she's thinking the exact same thing?

"So," she says, putting down the mug of coffee on the first horizontal surface she can find – terrific. She's using his advanced technology as a mere kitchen table and she's not even bothering with a coaster. "What year is it?"

"Around 3099."

"Haven't we been there already?"

He smiles. He likes how she makes it sound like this life could get redundant, like he could turn into a boring old man. Rose has the same, very slight stamp of arrogance shared by all young and beautiful people. It has its charms, he can't deny it, even on someone who's basically as old as time itself. It has its charms.

"Well," he answers, teases right back, "we might have been to _England_ in the late fourth century, but why let that stop us from thinking wider? I mean, unless you're homesick already."

It's actually been a while since he's taken Rose home for a bit. How long have they been travelling together? He can't remember how many years, but they are talking years, surely.

"Not in the slightest." She rises to the challenge.

He shrugs. "Italy's rather nice this time in history. No, wait – am I mixing my dates up again?" He remembers there'll be some political turmoil leading to civil war at some point, but he can't remember if it's in the fourth or fifth century. "Never mind. Anywhere but Italy."

"Why not leave Europe aside altogether?"

"Your wish is my command."

She raises a brow, like she knows he means it. "Okay," she says. "Surprise me. But somewhere hot. Where the beetles aren't too big. And –"

"Rose," he cuts her off, with a mock chiding tone, "time travel isn't an _a la carte_ menu."

He raises the lever for effect and they go up whirling. The coffee cup comes crashing on the floor. Rose finds balance against the wall expertly enough. She's been there long enough to land on her feet. He shouldn't love this, watching her struggle against gravity, holding tight as the Tardis rocks its way through time. Maybe it's just that he's thought of making her stumble, losing balance, for other reasons, in hundreds of different ways, the feel of her body swaying against his –

No. Now, they're on their way to someplace new, it's better that they don't stick around here too long, better that they're outside the Tardis rather than _inside_ , with no one trying to kill them, no aliens or humans to save, no distractions at all.

But he's been paying too much attention to her and not enough to the Tardis. He meant to send them somewhere near Florida but something's gone wrong and they're off course.

"Damn it," he curses.

"What is it? Are we lost?" She asks without genuine concern.

"Sort of. We shouldn't be too far off –"

Rose arches a skeptical brow. He has to admire her ability to hang on for dear life and look sarcastic at the same time. "You know," she says, "we should buy your Tardis a new sense of direction."

"Now, that's not fair." It really isn't. They're used to teasing each other but the Tardis is sacred, is like his baby – which is probably why she never tires of using it.

"Should I name all the times we've landed in the wrong place? Puerto Rico. Barcelona. Disneyland."

"Hey, you _loved_ Disneyland."

"That didn't make us any less lost."

Soon the ride gets too rocky for her to sustain the argument. Ha. The Tardis might lack a sense of direction, it sure isn't running short on stamina.

Finally, the air gets even and quieter, and he watches as Rose releases her hold on the wall behind her – too soon, he thinks, just as one last spasm sends her flying across the room.

"Christ." He lets go just a few seconds later and flies to her side. Though he doesn't get the chance to help her up or be chivalrous – she's basically on her feet by the time he gets there.

"I'm all right." She brushes imaginary dust from her clothes – a tank top and some tight shorts he's never seen her wear before. Of course, they have to buy her clothes frequently enough. With their lifestyle, it's easy to get holes in them or any alien substance that leaves them ruined – probably, they'll be due to go shopping again soon.

That's the sort of little things that does it, that tells him Rose has been around longer than most companions. But he ignores the warnings. What else is there to do?

"Am I dressed for the weather?" She asks.

He shrugs evasively. "We'll see."

Then, he extends his hand and, sure enough, she takes it, and out they go, towards the door of the Tardis, off to one more adventure…

For a second, absurd, inexplicable glitch, he sees himself stopping her, turning her back around. _Let's not go_ , he would say. _Not today. Let's just stay here, hidden from the world. Let's just steal immortality and cheat the clock forever_.

"Are you dragging your feet?" She aims an effective smile at him.

"On the contrary," he claims. "Ready as ever."

"Good."

And, of course, she means it. After all, isn't she here for the fun ride, the wonderful travels?

But if he had asked her to stay, he has this feeling she wouldn't have called him crazy.

They open the door and take the leap together. The outside air is hot and thick, smells faintly of burnt grass and wilderness.

 _Here we go. No more turning back_. He can't say exactly where they are, but it's not Florida for sure. _Where did you take us?_ He wonders. Will it be dangerous, packed with unbelievable creatures and plenty of thrill? Most certainly. The Tardis is full of surprises.

So is the young woman at his side. Maybe, the next time he feels like sticking this one out, when his mind sways between going or staying, he'll let Rose decide.

…

 **End Notes** : I've had a really pleasant time writing this. Please let me know your reactions and your thoughts on what should happen next. I've been given to read very exciting ideas over the years and it's always nice for the story to be an interactive experience. See you soon with an update!


	2. The Jungle

The first thing Rose notices when they step out of the Tardis is everything is green. Sunlight filtered by the canopy of leaves that cover the sky gives the air an emerald glow. It's only when they take a few more steps and hear a wet _splosh_ that she looks down and realizes they're two feet deep into a warm stream of water.

She must be making a face because the doctor is laughing when she looks up. "Count your blessings, Rose. At least we've landed in the right season."

That's for sure. The air is so hot, Rose can feel it as it enters her mouth and seeps into her lungs. No summer has ever been so hot as what she's experiencing right now. Incredible that, a few years ago, she was a nineteen-year-old who'd never stepped foot out of England and now she can tell just from the foreign _taste_ in the atmosphere that they're on a whole new continent.

"Where is this?"

"South America, I believe. If I'm not mistaken in my politics, there've been efforts to unite the subcontinent in the past two centuries. Lots of countries have changed their names – so, really, I couldn't even tell you where we are without being anachronical."

Rose makes sure he catches it when she faintly rolls her eyes at him. _Show-off_. "Yeah. And I'll bet there're plenty of forests like this in South America?"

"Jungles. And, why, yes, you're correct."

Her hand is still tucked into his and he brushes her knuckles with his thumb – ever so slightly. Grabbing her by the hand is maybe the first thing he's ever done to her, it came before hello or any introduction. Maybe he doesn't think she can tell the difference, but it's different now, his way of touching her.

Maybe he himself is unaware of it.

Yet again. He's been alive for so many years, she probably shouldn't underestimate him; he's had time to learn not to be careless.

"Shall we?" His lips break into a smile as he leads the way.

Rose has to admit, the farther they get from the Tardis, the less convinced she is this is the ideal place for a holiday. Not that she'd ever admit that to _him_ , of course – if he's game, she's game. It's just how things work. It matters to her that he understands there's no place too scary, no ground too hostile where she can't follow. In these moments, Rose forgets the differences between them. That, of course, she's at a disadvantage, that she's barely an adult, that's she's _human_ – the doctor might insist he's not immortal, he knows, and she knows, she's the more mortal of them both.

What a sad, unfair position. Rose doesn't care that the doctor loves humans, probably took her in in the first place _because_ she's human. Sometimes, it feels cruel, like if they're not going to be on an equal footing, it isn't right for him to love her in the first place.

That's what she might answer if he ever tells her, which he never does.

( _Does it need saying?_ )

Maybe because she knows – which to be fair, she does – but maybe because he's afraid of what _she_ 'll say, because with her, it'll matter more than with the others.

 _Why did you show me eternity if you knew you couldn't share it?_

She won't forget the words he spoke to her, when they ran into one of his old companions. 'You can spend the rest of your life with me. But I can never spend mine with yours.'

So maybe there's no point in following where he goes, in going on such wonderful journeys together – but what else is there? If she left, if she _stopped_ , Rose Tyler is quite convinced nothing would ever matter to her anymore.

"Wait," the doctor's hand reaches higher, clutches her forearm until she's stilled behind him.

"What is it?" She asks as he prods the high grass with the tip of his shoe.

" _That_ is a wonderful evidence of species evolution, Rose. Wait a second." He turns to her, his nose puckered. "You're not scared of snakes, are you?"

"Hum…"

So at least she knows what to expect. In fact, Rose's never had the occasion of being afraid of such a thing as snakes, has never seen one in London, unsurprisingly enough.

The gleam in the doctor's eye is undiluted excitement and just a little spark of madness. How is it that he takes her to the most dangerous of places and yet, Rose feels she didn't know what it was to be _alive_ until she joined his side?

Carefully, while his eyes are fixed on her in a blend of challenge and malice, he removes his foot from the grass and Rose can make out the slithering shape of a thick, blue-scaled snake.

Her heart races from the sight, thrill – or maybe shock – draws a smile on her lips. She's never seen a snake like that, even on television. Its skin looks like a gem, blue as robins' eggs.

"Do they exist when I'm from?" She asks.

"No – not for a few more centuries, I should think." His hand is firm around her wrist now. "We should get going, though. They don't generally bite humans, but when they do, it doesn't tend to end well for your kind."

Smoothly, he draws her away from the animal, and Rose makes a closer inspection of the ground with each footstep. "Are there other venomous crawlers I should look out for?"

"Well, every jungle's got its fair share of nasty beetles. Bullet ants, poison frogs, and spiders, of course."

"Ew. I'll take snakes over spiders any day of the week."

The doctor casts a look at her. "You want to head back? We can go somewhere a little more comfortable. Really, we can even wait a little before we decide – it's not like a couple of days in the Tardis will kill us."

Rose raises her brows at him, appraising his face for clues. Is he testing her? The doctor's not one to say no to an adventure, and they've hardly been there for half an hour. He's made it clear a long time ago that his companions adopt his lifestyle and not – _never_ – the other way around. Sometimes, by the time he and Rose return to the Tardis, she feels like she's been stranded on a desert island for years and that blue-box of a time machine is a rescue ship. A ship that never takes you home, always on a new adventure, but which is sometimes a _sort of home_ in itself.

Now is much too early to head back, not that she'd have anything against it. Sometimes, she and the doctor have stayed on the Tardis for as long as a few days, doing nothing but exchanging quiet thoughts, eating strange food from stranger worlds, looking at the stars, the earth that looks like a tiny dot from where they are. Sometimes, Rose has those thoughts she can't quite repress, when it strikes her it's these _anticlimactic_ moments she cherishes most. When they've saved the day – if not the world – have stopped another apocalypse, saved millions of alien or human lives, and they indulge in a few hours of break, eating chips at a random diner.

It's not that she misses normal. It's just that the rush of extraordinary journeys so often sweeps away other things that matter…

Rose's eyes turn slightly suspicious. What game is he playing? " _You_ want to go back?" She weighs each word carefully.

"Oh, no," his answer is hasty and sure. "No, I'm right as rain, Rose Tyler. Just that I'd be willing to, if you're not in the mood –"

"Of course not." She scowls, wants to sound offended. "I'll teach you better than to coddle me, old man." Out of defiance, she breaks loose from the hold of his hand, smiles playfully at him. "I'll walk first and you can follow, how's that?"

"I'm actually not sure –"

"What, afraid you can't catch up?"

He sighs. The look in his eyes is serious. _You'll be the death of me, woman_.

"Just be careful," he says. "You never know the sort of things –"

Rose's scream cuts into his words, and suddenly the doctor's blood runs cold, as if a silver knife has pierced the fabric of his sanity.

" _Rose_."

He's heard her scream from fear before, surprise, but this is different. She's _hurt_. He knows, right away, and can't exactly explain how he flies to her side and puts his arms around her, the distance is bridged in a haze.

Suddenly, the young woman is in his arms, her eyes fading in awareness and recognition. He feels the warm moistness of blood on his fingers and realizes an arrow sticks out from the ground, at his feet.

When he looks up from Rose's face, the figures of a dozen men are slowly disentangling from the dark mass of trees ahead. Their clothes and camouflage hint they're ready for warfare.

"What do you think?" One of them asks, most likely to the leader, a young man who is holding a crossbow. "Does he look like a barbarian to you?"

The doctor realizes they're talking about him, trying to determine if he poses a threat.

Their timing couldn't be worse. With Rose Tyler bleeding in his arms, the doctor not only _looks_ like a barbarian. He very much feels like one.

…

 **End Notes** : please share your thoughts. Also, if you've got any ideas for stories starring Rose and 10, I'm willing to give them a try, including AU.


	3. Time

In the span of a few seconds, while the group observes the doctor cautiously, he prays for rational thoughts, for a sudden burst of clarity to come in and save him. Only humans would lose their cool in this sort of situation. Only humans would stare in helpless fear and fury at the unconscious blonde, whose face is turning ash, whose hot blood feels irreversible on their fingers.

"No," he hears himself say. Ridiculous. _Ridiculous_. "No."

He should be negotiating. He should be convincing the armed group in front of him he isn't a threat.

"Hey, sir?" One of the men speaks.

Though the doctor doesn't look up from Rose's face, he identifies the voice as belonging to the young man holding a crossbow. In all likelihood, the leader – and the man who shot Rose.

"Would you mind putting your hands where I can see them?"

Then the doctor does look back at him, which is a rookie miscalculation. Just in the way that the man's hands straighten around his weapon, the doctor knows his eyes are full of that savage, unearthly gleam that sometimes makes its way in. The doctor thought he'd gotten better than this at keeping things below the surface. Yet again, he didn't think he had a problem with accepting death as a natural part of human existence until he felt the weight of Rose's body in his arms.

"I'm sorry." He is careful in every word, knows he has to win them over with speech, because his eyes are working against him. "The woman you shot is my friend. I can't let her go right now. I'm unarmed, and I'm not involved in your conflict."

The young man chuckles. His reddish hair is long and unwashed, tied behind his head. Their clothes are all the same camouflage shade that made them so hard to spot in the first place.

In the practical part of his brain, which is always working, the doctor tries to gather clues as to who they are, how they could have taken him by surprise.

South America. Clans. Guerilla weapons. Why doesn't that ring a bell? Granted, the doctor hasn't been in this continent before around that time of history, is unfamiliar with the specifics –

To the best of his knowledge, the government in place was in the line of unpopular dictatorships – yes, they were actually a popular few – an authoritative state governed by oligarchs, nothing too uncommon in human history. But he's never heard of a body of resistance hiding in the jungle.

Which means two things, of course.

First of all, they'll fail.

Second of all, he hasn't a clue what to expect from them.

The redheaded young man looks appraisingly at him, not lowering his weapon. The men and women standing behind him are his people, he's only looking out for them.

The fire in the doctor's eyes isn't doing him any good.

But maybe the leader's not completely unmoved by the bleeding girl he's holding.

"What's your name?" He asks.

"We've got no time for this. If you don't take me somewhere where I can take care of her –"

"I decide what we have time for. You want to save your friend, you'll play by my rules."

The doctor's hands are tight fists, numb, sticky from Rose's blood. "Whatever you say," he capitulates. "I'm called the doctor. I'm a traveler, I don't know much about your world. But if you don't let me save this woman's life in the next few minutes, I think I might destroy it.

The redheaded young man waits. This is an important decision. Suddenly, one of his people remarks, "They don't really look like barbarians to me."

And that's good enough for him.

The leader draws in a thoughtful breath. "All right," he speaks, almost to himself, but without taking his eyes off the doctor. "All right, let's take them home."

…

Rose is vaguely aware of being carried somewhere. Through the blood drumming in her ears, she can hear the rhythm of footsteps beating the ground, blades cutting into the high grass of the jungle. She makes out a vague human chatter but also the myriad noises particular to this new setting she was supposed to merrily discover with the doctor. Swarming insects creep low beneath the grass, flee as the group shuffles its way through the wilderness. Bird wings fluttering from one tree to another, louder than they usually sound – they must be huge, or maybe it's just easier to focus with your eyes closed, after an arrow pierced through your side. It sure puts things into perspective.

The pain is not _so_ bad, but worse than anything Rose can think of in comparison – worse than when she sprained her ankle on Planet Mars, when a horde of unidentified extraterrestrials were chasing them. The worst possible time the doctor's ever seen anyone sprain an ankle, he obviously observed, even though the aliens turned out to be relatively harmless and actually friendly.

There was also the time she broke her wrist – nothing dangerous, just a bad fall stepping out of the Tardis – the time she sank knee-deep in a swamp where the mud turned out to have mingled with poisonous substance, _that_ burned for at least a couple of days.

What's funny is before Rose met the doctor, she'd never so much as broken a fingernail.

 _You'd think that'd make me afraid of the pain, that I'd look ridiculous risking my life by his side, the same old joke as the city girl taken to the countryside, who shrieks when she gets dirt on her shoes._

She's not a little girl the doctor needs to comfort every five seconds.

It's a small comfort, but Rose welcomes it in.

Maybe, after enough time doing this, she'll look as little human as him.

The good news is – though Rose is no _doctor_ herself – she doesn't think the arrow did too much damage. Really, it got her right below the ribs, in the waist, just muscle and fat, she hopes, damaging no organ. She can still feel it sticking out from beneath her top, which has rolled up slightly above her navel.

The doctor is careful not to disturb the arrow as he carries her.

Yes, she can _feel_ , without being able to see whose arms she's actually in, that it's him. The feel of his familiar suit against her, the light smell coming from him, one that fills the Tardis, that's not really more particular than anyone's regular fragrance, but one she knows she'll never find anywhere on planet earth. And the gentleness with which he holds her, _too_ _gentle_ , too measured, letting her know how angry he is, that he's holding back, careful not to leave unintentional bruises on her.

From what she's gathered, the doctor isn't big on revenge. It's just not who he is.

Yet she's sure if she'd been killed today, that wouldn't have mattered in the least.

…

"So, where are you from?" The leader asks, casually enough, as if nothing was more natural than to ask someone casual questions after shooting their friend.

The doctor appraises the man briefly, without interrupting their walk – he said their camp was only half an hour from here and he would like to make it in twenty.

Rose is going to be okay, he knows. Cannot tolerate any alternative. The arrow's still in, she's not bleeding too bad, and her pulse is steady. After he's cleaned her wound and bandaged her up, _then_ , maybe he'll care about getting to know the people they've stumbled upon.

Still, they're the ones with weapons – the doctor actually thinks he and Rose might have just been taken prisoners – so he answers, "London."

Monosyllables are supposed to give off the hint that you're not in the mood for a chat. The doctor would much rather be left alone, give free range to his thoughts –

 _Why? So you can ponder on that sham of a paradise you sell these girls, your precious companions, that shameless lie in the word 'forever'?_

 _For-ev-er._

Each letter taunts him, laughs at his illusions.

Mortal blood on his fingers.

It's been unfair to let her say it, to allow her to deceive herself, to deceive them both.

"I'm Clay, by the way," the leader resumes. "You want to actually tell me your name, doctor, or do people really call you that?"

"They really call me that."

"What about your friend's name?"

The doctor clenches his jaw. Ah, the sort of anger he feels can't be expressed in human words. Beings who get to be hundreds of years old simply don't feel things the same way as men do. It doesn't matter that the difference is a matter of degree rather than nature. _Immortal_ anger isn't anger at all – you learn to tame it, to live with it always, to accept it as a full-blown part of you like your blood and bones.

 _This_ , of course, is what forever looks like. Not Rose's smiling and youthful face. When Rose is gone, when every place they've been together has crumbled into dust, that anger will still be there.

 _And so will I_ , the doctor thinks, teeth grinding against teeth.

"She can tell you that herself, when she wakes up," he answers.

"You're not really warming up to me, are you?" Clay says, before shrugging his shoulders. "Well. I'll grow on you. You'll see. I usually do."

"You usually shoot unarmed girls as well?"

The doctor gives himself an inward chiding. He knows – _should know_ – better than being impulsive. But the young man just breaks into a careless laugh. "I am sorry about your friend. It's just I wasn't expecting anyone peaceful to be wandering about. This is a war zone, you do know that?"

"Afraid we missed the warnings."

"That's all right. It's a big and nasty enemy we're fighting, we can always use an extra hand."

The doctor looks down at Rose's face. But for her slightly pale complexion and the beads of sweat rolling down her forehead, he could almost think she was sleeping.

"No," he says, and senses as Clay's eyes on him become sharper. They're very dark, almost black, oddly make him look like a fox.

The doctor catches the full meaning of their hostile silent.

Just because he's been trying to make small talk and looking friendly doesn't mean that they're friends.

"After we get her fixed up," the doctor continues, "she and I will just go back to where we came from."

"I'm afraid that's not an option. We could use a doctor in our ranks. Considering what we're up against, we're going to need all the help we can get."

Then, Clay's eyes lower to the unconscious woman in the doctor's arms. The doctor can feel the young man's gaze on her, reads the threat that hangs in the air between them.

"You'll help us," he says, doesn't openly establish this as a bargain, "and your friend will be back on her feet in no time. You'll see," he says. "She'll like me too, in time. Like I said. I grow on people."

Unsurprisingly, the doctor very much doubts that.


	4. I Smell Trouble

Rose regains consciousness in gasps. The sky in the jungle is a canopy of thick-smelling leaves, but when she blinks, it leaves place to an indoor ceiling and blinding neon lights. Shirtless, she can feel the stiff coolness of the table she's been laid on.

"Where –"

"Please lie still." A male voice interjects. Though her vision is somewhat blurred, she catches a round, pleasant face, a flash of kindhearted blue eyes. "It's all right. I'm a doctor."

The pain in her side is sharp but also distant, and this time Rose feels as consciousness flows out of her grip.

When she opens her eyes again, her head is steadier, and she takes in the room all at once – greenish tiling on the floor and walls, which makes her think of a giant chessboard or a depressing kitchen. No windows, no light except the one coming from the neon, which is overly white. The table Rose is lying on is metal, smeared with an inelegant streak of blood. Most certainly hers. Around, there are no other objects than surgical instruments, clamps, scalpels, and any number of tools Rose is unable to identify.

Without thinking, Rose tries to sit up and moans at the biting pain in her stomach.

"Wait, you shouldn't move –"

The voice is coming from behind her and, since Rose can't turn around, she glances down at her upper body. The freshly sutured flesh makes her nauseous and a little proud. The pattern of the black thread looks absurd on her skin, still rosy-pink.

"Gross."

"Don't look. I'm going to put a bandage on."

"A little too late."

"Are you going to be sick?"

By then, the young man is leaning into her. His attention is sweet enough if not exactly professional – Rose has watched enough medical drama to know he should be wearing a mask, and he's not done too neat a job sewing her up.

Nor is he actually wearing the standard doctor's uniform. Plain blue jeans – high-waist, possibly it's trendy again – and a checkered shirt that makes her think of Clark Kent (what Hollywoodian producers think farmers dress like). The man may be as old as thirty, though his soft face and the brown mop of hair that frames it makes him look teenage-young.

Rose realizes she's one-sidedly appraising him. While she was lying unconscious on his operating table, he probably had all the leisure he needed to appraise her.

This draws attention to the fact that she's naked from the waist up, except for her the lacy material of her black bra.

"Might I have my shirt back?"

"If you just let me finish dressing your wound."

Rose draws in a sharp breath. She wishes she could drain her voice from anger – borrow a page from the Doctor's book, who's so good at keeping things in – but there's no fighting the edge of concern in her tone when she asks, "Where's the Doctor?"

The young man gives her his amiable smile. "I am the doctor."

A fist-sized knot comes jamming Rose's throat. "I mean my friend. The man who carried me here."

"Oh. Tall skinny fellow in a striped suit?"

Rose doesn't buy into the casualness of his answer. Suddenly, it strikes her that the Doctor wouldn't have left her alone, to be operated on and wake up with a complete stranger. Not willingly.

"No, he's all right," the brown-haired young man assures. "Clay's probably just getting to know him a little – Clay's our leader."

"Uh-huh."

"You've got nothing to worry about. He's just a bit cautious around strangers – which you'd understand, if you'd been through what we have. I understand you're from England?"

Rose manages a small nod.

"Well." The man smiles. "I'll just get a clean bandage for you. Will you lie down?"

Rose feigns to comply but, as soon as the man has his back turned, springs to her feet and shoots for the door.

Acts on instinct alone, pays no mind to the sharp sting in her side as she moves or the fact that she's half naked.

As she hears the young amateur-surgeon shout after her, it flashes through her brain that she might have wanted to think this through. After all, the people here have all the advantages – they know the territory, while she can at best blindly hope to run into the Doctor.

But it's too late to take it back.

Once you've made such a decision, there's nothing to do but stick to it. Without a time machine, the fabric of reality simply isn't one of those flimsy substances where you can thrust your hand and take something back.

And so Rose keeps on running.

Outside the door, she discovers a greyish corridor that looks more disaffected even than the other room. Light is dim, white, but she takes no time to pause, to really appraise her surroundings. In her race, only a few details strike her, and she can't decide yet whether it's because they're unusual – the shabby looks of the place, the absence of windows – Rose doesn't indulge in the split-second of thought this would require.

Getting away.

Getting to the Doctor.

But soon the other end of the corridor fills up with a small group of men, dressed in the same casual way as the man who was patching her up.

"Hey!" One shouts, not really with menace so much as surprise.

Rose's heart hammers in her chest, blood beats at her temple and she feels her skin is moist with sweat – _blood_? – her head spins, and it flashes through her mind that they might have given her drugs.

"Wait, stop!"

But Rose shoots for the first door that stands between her and the men. Kidnappers, for all she knows – murderers.

"Where is the Doctor? Where is the Doctor?" She mutters in a breath.

The door opens, thank heaven, but not on the outside, or anywhere that gives her much space to go on running, as she had hoped.

The place she's entered looks something like a kitchen, one you'd sooner have nothing to do with, let alone eat in – but given her options, Rose is happy enough with what she gets. Once she realizes there'll be no running beyond that room – no door, no windows – she leaps for the first drawer she sees, wrenches it out from its socket in her haste and drops to her knees until she can get her hand on some sort of weapon.

By the time the men are opening the door, she's clutching a kitchen knife, with eyes earnest enough that, if she's going to look like a crazy half-naked woman running for her life, she'll at least look like a dangerous one.

The first man to enter looks innocuous enough – holding his hand in the air, and saying, "Easy," like she's some rabid animal. Coppery hair, dark eyes, but then she catches the fox smile on his face, and _innocuous_ is out of the picture.

His gaze sweeps down her chest to her bare stomach, where she can feel blood pearling down to the hem of her shorts.

"Hell," he chuckles, to calm her down. "Take it easy, girl."

He acts like he's good at this – like that smile usually works for him.

Rose's hand remains firm on the knife. A lot of men are pouring in, now, and she knows it's not going to make much of a difference. She won't have the upper hand on all of them.

The message seems to cross from her mind to the young man with the fox smile.

Rose clenches her teeth and says, "Yeah, that's right. Have a shot. Maybe you can take me. Maybe I won't get all of you, but I'll get whoever comes first, and from what I can tell, your doc's not wonderful at his job. So unless you want to tell me where my friend is –"

She loses all breath needed to finish her threat when the Doctor steps through the now ajar door. His eyes, alert, black with the anger that's been pooling in them since this happened to her, have an immediately soothing effect on her.

Still, she doesn't drop the knife.

She won't, until she's heard from his mouth that these people are good.

The unfolding should be very quick – some word or motion from the Doctor to indicate it's okay, he knows them, there's no point in fighting.

But for some unfathomable reason, the urgency of the situation doesn't quite catch up with them.

Something happens, when the Doctor and Rose lock eyes, and she can see everything – everything in those eyes that are usually guarded.

The fear, the _rage_ he experienced, when he thought he was going to lose her.

Which he did.

Oh, there are only few times when she's seen the Doctor look at her like that.

He thinks she doesn't notice – or hopes so – but she can see it, can see the dark abysses that open up in his eyes, when he fears for her life.

And, as always, the intensity of it mesmerizes her, in a way she doesn't suspect anyone that hasn't been loved by a Time Lord could understand.

Then the Doctor directs his eyes on the redheaded young man, and speaks with a tone so cold it cuts even her. "You said she'd be _safe_."

"Well, sorry I didn't count on her having a fit and acting crazy."

The Doctor gives Clay no time to finish before he crosses the room to join Rose, takes off his jacket in a swift motion and gives it to her.

Heat is on his clothes and on his fingers when they brush hers passing. It's also in his eyes, still – she wishes they could be alone, back in the TARDIS, without the small crowd around them.

If it was only him and eternity and her right now, without witnesses – would he still try to lie?

Rose clutches the jacket tight, her fist against her stomach, not so much out of modesty than due to the sheer intensity of the situation.

"We haven't tried cross-dressing before," she breathes before he's moved away from her.

Covering her from the gazes of the rest of the group, she spots a gleam of surprise in his eyes when he meets hers, immediately followed by a seriousness meant to admonish her for joking, now of all times.

"Rose," he says back, and like her own words, his are only hers to catch. "Don't tease. Not now."

Not when he thought for several minutes that she was going to die.

His hand brushes her wrist – bare, she's not put on his jacket but wrapped herself in it – before he grips more firmly at her hand, the one that's not holding the coat, and he leads her back towards the group.

That's when Rose knows this is going to be their next adventure.

All adventures that start with the Doctor start with him taking her hand that way.

"Rose," he says. "These people call themselves Rebels."

He needn't specify that they're human, too. Her brief interview with the doctor – lowercase 'd' – and the fox smile on the redheaded man, is enough for her to be able to tell they're not looking at any foreign species, however average-looking.

"We happened to step right into the middle of their war zone."

"At war against what?" She asks.

"Barbarians, sweetheart."

The redheaded man was the one to answer. Throwing his head back, he swaggers to her and extends his hand forward.

So, handshaking is still a thing in whenever-they've-landed.

"What else can you call the twisted power-holders who oppress ninety-nine percent of the people? I'm Clay, by the way. And I'd be the one that shot you, I'm afraid – much unfortunate. I never spill the blood of people who haven't sworn themselves to my cause first."

Rose stares at him for a few seconds, and the hand he holds out to her. With one, she's still clutching the Doctor's jacket, and the other is tucked firmly in the Doctor's hand.

Clay reads her unwillingness to meet him halfway and chuckles. "Well, the two of you have had an exhaustive day. If that's all right, I'll have one of my people take you somewhere you can rest and be alone." His smile jerks into a wince. "And I'll have to send the doc to see you. Looks like you burst your stitches."

Rose doesn't protest.

He had her at "somewhere they can be alone" and "rest".

…

"What is this place?" Rose asks the Doctor.

Clay's men took them to a room that can't seem to decide whether it's a bedroom, a living room or a prison cell. A small, single bed in a corner, flush with a windowless wall. A table, a chair, but apart from that, the furniture is scarce. Reddish-brown carpet that makes Rose feel like the Doctor is pacing in quicksand – and he is pacing the room, the way he does when he wants to think.

Rose herself on the bed, half-sitting half-lying down, struggling for the least painful position.

"The year?" The Doctor answers. "3066. The country's officially known as the United States of South America – it goes about from Brazil to Argentina, minus a few independent territories. And it's a state of war." He shakes his head.

It's the first time it crosses Rose's mind what the Doctor's actually going through – he feels guilty as hell.

"Damn it. Of all places to get lost, Rose, this is not the right one. The president, one Mustafa Van Debar, has taken one too many unpopular decisions, and a great deal of the population scattered under different leaders and tried to declare their independence. That's where we're at. Civil war. Clay's rebels might be fighting for a good cause, in theory – still their means are no different from what your country's seen of warfare in the twentieth century."

Rose smiles.

The Doctor looks puzzled and interrupts his pacing for a while.

She loves it when he turns history teacher without warning. "I meant this building," she said.

He looks up at the ceiling, his mouth also breaking into a smile. "My best guess is as good as yours. Some sort of sweatshop fallen into disuse, given the location."

"Hey," Rose means to sound earnest now. "We've known the end of the world, remember? A few times. Surely, we've been to worse places than war."

But the look on his face remains serious.

Pragmatic, Rose raises her shoulders, ignores the pain in her stomach that springs to life with every move. She still isn't wearing anything under the Doctor's jacket. She wonders if that has anything to do with his nervous pacing, his efforts not to look at her.

"So, what do we do?" She asks.

"Obviously, we have to be political about this. Now that Clay's taken us to his camp, he can't very well afford for us to leave it. We've seen too much."

Rose nods her head, tries to act like that doesn't mean something as bad as what she's thinking – that they're basically prisoners here, trying to act as guests.

"That man," she says, "their leader. Do you trust him?"

She watches as his mouth becomes a thin white line on his face. "No."

Rose attempts humor, "Because he shot me?"

He gives her another don't-tease look – looks that always have the opposite effect of what they're trying to achieve, because she _will_ tease, if only so she can get those smoldering black gazes out of him.

"For starters. And I don't like his way of talking to us, to his people. He's too used to his charm-act working on them."

"He is charming," Rose concedes.

"And all the more dangerous for it. I've seen populist leaders become as bad as the tyrants they're trying to take down, before they've even replaced them on the highest seat in the country."

"And you think Clay has tyrant-seeds in him?"

The Doctor shrugs. His seriousness is somewhat an admonishment of Rose's persistence to have fun with this – they came here on holiday, for Christ's sake, and if they were to stop having fun every time things get dangerous, theirs would be boring lives to say the least.

But 'fun' was probably out of the picture from the moment she got shot in front of him.

"Could be," he says.

She takes advantage of the fact that he's locked eyes with her again to hold him there – to keep him from shifting, the way he does when things get real.

Her hand is tight around his jacket again, from the intensity of the unspoken torrent that pours between them.

"Well, we'll just have to see it through to the end," she says, "won't we?"

She knows she framed it in such a way that he'll understand she means not only this jungle they've landed in – civil war and revolution.

Rose counts them as small victories, those times when she gets the Doctor saying things that mean more than what they seem.

 _Am I a fool for thinking these are commitments?_

 _I promised myself for eternity, but he never promised himself back._

As she clenches her jaw, Rose inwardly vows that this time will be different. This isn't just another adventure where they'll share unimaginable things, things they'll put away as soon as they step back into the Tardis.

 _This time, I'll make it last. I'll make it_ mean _something._

How can eternity mean anything when the feelings all fade, in the end, under that surface of immovable coldness on his face?

 _I'll show him,_ she thinks _._

He's showed her things that belong to lost ages, things that have died, disappeared, and she'll show him things everlasting.

 _I'll give him something that'll make a difference, that'll last even to the extremity of his immortal life._

 _Am I the first woman to think that?_

As if to answer all these questions, the Doctor agrees gravely, "I guess we will."


	5. Running in Circles

The way to nightfall is long and literally painful – try getting shot in the stomach then running around – but Rose finds she doesn't hate every second of it.

They're spending the night in the same small room they've been taken to earlier. Before she's even registered this is going to be their actual "quarters", the Doctor warns he wants no rejection of gallantry on whatever basis, she's taking the bed and that's that.

"Excuse me?"

She blinks at him; as if it's her type to reject gallantry in the first place – especially when it comes from him.

"You're injured," he points out.

"Would you have actually taken it if I wasn't?"

He doesn't deny her point, and her lips break into a smile.

"I'm teasing. Of course, I'll take the bed." She adds, not on a particularly suggestive tone. "Not that it's that small, either, for a single bed. We could probably –"

The doc's visit interrupts them, and she never gets around to finish. His name, she learns, is Darius, and he looks sorry about the state of her stitches.

"I'm going to need you back on the operating table."

"Nonsense," she protests.

The pain in her tummy is peanuts compared to her dread of being drugged and laid unconscious for some stranger to operate on her.

It still isn't clear to her that any of these people can be trusted.

"I'm fine. Just need a little rest. You can just clean it up and – I don't know. Give me my shirt back," she shrugs.

Darius gives her a smile that's half-encouraging half-embarrassed. "You can get new clothes. I'm afraid your old ones are a little – uh, stained."

Rose's eyes sweep over his face, like he's a specimen to study in biology class.

A doctor who flinches at saying blood, but not at the sight of it.

"Right," she says.

The Doctor himself speaks little, watching the scene from the other corner of the room, with his arms crossed over his chest.

"How are we doing about the pain?" Darius asks.

Rose shrugs again. It isn't just about looking tough in front of the Doctor – even if these people aren't enemies, they are reluctant allies at the very best, and Rose finds it preferable not to show weakness.

 _Just because we're in a jungle doesn't mean it's the law of the jungle out there._

But just in case.

"The reason I'm asking is I want to know if you need painkillers," he says. "We do have some, though in limited amounts. I mean, if you can do without them –"

"Now," the Doctor begins, taking a step closer.

Rose is still sitting on the bed, Darius had been crouching next to her to examine her and has now resumed a more upright position.

"It's okay," Rose interrupts. "I don't want drugs. Really."

"You were _shot_."

But Rose remains adamant, and the Doctor doesn't push for concessions. All the while, Darius is shooting tentative glances at them turn by turn. "All right." He breaks the word into two perfect syllables, each less assertive than the next. "By the way, Clay told me to ask, are you all right with just one room? We could find another spare one. The one thing that's not lacking in quantity in here is space."

Hesitation creeps its way in. Rose wonders if she should say she and the Doctor are married, if marriage is still a fashionable institution by then.

The Doctor just says, "The room is fine."

"We've done with smaller," Rose adds.

The Doctor shoots her a reproving look. He waits until Darius has slipped out of the room, with an eagerness he makes no effort to hide, before he says, "It's bigger on the inside. You _know_ that."

…

Drugs or no, Rose finds the hours that follow the jungle-incident fly by for her in an astonishing fashion.

One moment, she's exchanging witty remarks with the Doctor, half-lying on the bed, the next the room is turning dark around the edges, and the next thing she knows, she's been sleeping for five hours, and the Doctor is brandishing a plate-full of scrambled eggs at her. "Breakfast?"

"Uh?"

"They're powdered eggs, I'm afraid, and that's dehydrated bread. You won't see the likes of it in England until another fifty years – your timeframe, I mean – but it does the trick when you're in need of calories." There's a layer of polished lightness in his tone, but the graveness in him stands out like a shadow as he adds, "You're feverish, Rose. I don't like this. We'll talk more after you've eaten, but I think it's safer we sit this one out, get back to the Tardis as soon as we can."

Rose is silent for a bit, trying to coordinate her brain with the wave of nausea that hits at the smell of food being thrust at her.

"You don't move that plate right now, I'm gonna be sick."

The Doctor is quick to react and gets it out of the way. Once it's sitting innocently at the other end of the room, he takes a seat next to her on the bed.

"I'm sorry. You just concentrate on getting better, okay? I shouldn't be heaping more troubles on you right now –"

"Now, wait," she admonishes. Takes what she called her _Doctor_ tone. "You and I don't keep each other out of trouble, remember? We share all. I took a bullet, I can take your concern."

A half-smile tugs at his lips – it's not as cocky as she's seen it.

He hasn't forgiven himself for what's happened.

"Well, I don't want you to think there's cause for panic. But to be completely honest, I do think we should be on our way as soon as possible."

Rose arches an eyebrow, can't resist teasing him. "Take the coward's way out?"

"There's adventure all over the universe, isn't there? What harm is there in waiting until you've recovered to explore it?"

Because he isn't scolding her or casting smoky looks at her from beneath furrowed brows, she knows this is serious –

He's trying to coax her.

That can only mean there's real danger ahead.

Understanding passes from her face to his in solemn silence.

"Give it to me straight," she says.

And the Doctor does.

"We're in the middle of the jungle here," he says. "It's over a hundred degrees. From what I can tell, these people have no proper medical equipment and limited supplies of food. Infection's a real risk, and I don't want to run it. I don't, Rose."

His eyes have opened up on abysses again, abysses that seem to be looking at her and drawing her in, cutting the breath from her throat.

"What do you want?" She hears the words slip past her lips.

It's only when he takes a step back she realizes how close to her he'd gotten. Deep into the blackness of his gaze, all notion of space has dimmed in the background, and its turning real again stings unexpectedly.

The Doctor shrugs – resuming light-mannered behavior.

She could have slapped him.

But his honesty belies his casualness.

"I want us both back in the Tardis, where we can lie low for a couple of weeks. I want to treat you so precious, you'll think you're the queen of England, only far younger and prettier. I want us not to go outside for anything more dicey than cotton candy at some fun fair. That sounds pretty good to me."

And it sounds nice to her, too.

From the moment she met the Doctor, life has been all adventures and games, a never-stopping roller coaster ride on which the important things are deferred, unspoken, cast aside.

There could be worse things than pressing pause and see what happened, she thinks.

Or does he believe that's what she's after?

The rush, the adrenaline –

No.

No, he must know better.

But at some point, it won't be enough, just telling herself he knows.

Sooner or later, they'll have to say it.

Not right now, though.

"Okay," she says.

He frowns – like he's been expecting resistance. "Yeah?"

"Hey, you just offered to make me the queen of England."

"If that'll get you back inside the Tardis safe, I'll make you the queen of the bloody universe."

"I might just hold you to that promise."

She chuckles.

"What?"

"Well, it's just that it's another thing we haven't tried – roleplay."

The Doctor sighs. "I'll tell you what. You can focus on getting well and the first few decisions you'll take as a monarch. I'll try and come up with a way we can get out of here. Deal?"

"Deal."

…

She really has to stop doing that to him. How her lips roll into a grin, even as she's bleeding on the mattress. If he wants to get them out of here, to be efficient, then she must stop distracting him –

Yet he can't seem to make her want to.

A while later, after she's dozed off again, unfortunately without changing her mind about breakfast, the Doctor goes out to see if he and that rebel leader Clay can have a tête à tête.

He figures finding an excuse for him and Rose to get out of here shouldn't be too difficult, and once they're out, they can make a run for it. The Tardis isn't that far back, and he'll know his way around – the rebels are probably counting on the fact that he won't. After all, he's an Englishman in a jungle. How much of a threat can they think he'll be?

Some people point him to Clay's office. His request doesn't cause much fuss. There's no armed bodyguards there to make sure he isn't ill-intended – no one at all waiting at the wooden door on the top floor, where the Doctor assumes the overseer used to spend his days.

Clay invites him in right away. He's showered and changed into regular clothes since the Doctor has last seen him.

"How's your friend?" He asks, with a casualness the Doctor immediately dislikes. "I haven't gotten a chance to see the doc yet."

"She's resting."

"Rest is good."

 _Not getting shot is better_ , the Doctor thinks, but remembers what he's told Rose about their whole situation. They need to be _political_.

"So, what do you want?"

Clay sits down at his desk and surprises the Doctor slightly by how at ease he looks – he's not put his feet on the table, just stretched his arms behind his head, but the message comes through clear as rainwater.

He owns this place. And the people in it.

This is his revolution. This is his jungle.

"I assume you came here because you wanted to ask for something. And I'm glad you did, really. It gives me a chance to see you a bit, get around to talking about the rules."

A smile stretches his boyish face. One eyelid crunches up, as if he had the sun in his eyes.

The Doctor drinks in everything about his body language, down to the last smallest clue that might prove useful.

"In fact," Clay says, "I'll go first. I heard you were taken to the kitchen. That's okay, considering the circumstances. You have an injured woman, and you won't find no fellow more chivalrous than myself, I say."

The Doctor's gut clenches at his statement.

Decidedly. He doesn't like, or trust, that young man for one second.

"But that was special, right? From now on, food comes in once a day, we leave it to you to handle it as you will so it'll last you until the next morning. Naturally, you understand we need to ration food supplies, for everyone's best interest."

The Doctor tilts his head to the side, wears his finest diplomatic face. "Naturally."

"That's the first rule. Don't worry, there aren't that many. We're a free people here," again with that smile that's not working on the Doctor a bit. "Everyone gets the same food, and the same amount. I don't want you to think anyone in this camp is getting more by greasing some paws. That's just not how we roll. So, rule number two, you don't leave camp without warning where you're going. Plain commonsense, isn't it? We're in the middle of a war here, we can't have people wandering around camp and risking to give away our position. Third and final rule," he pauses a moment, for effect. "No fighting. We aren't animals here, or barbarians – we settle our issues like civilized people. Any quarrel goes through to me. If it's really going to come to blows, then it happens when I say it, where I say it."

"Oh, trust me," the Doctor is smiling now himself, but his is colder than the water that runs beneath a layer of ice. What with everything that's happened, he's not feeling far from ruthless. "That won't be a problem."

"Well, good. Now that that's settled – I believe you were going to ask me something."

"Really, you nearly gave me all I came here for," the Doctor shrugs. "I just wanted to understand exactly what you wanted from us."

In fact, he wanted a clearer idea what strategy he should adopt, and now, he's got his answer.

What he's learned from Clay, in the past few minutes, is that he and Rose are being lied to.

If the Rebels are short on food, then why would Clay decide to bring in two total strangers, including one injured woman, when they'll only be mouths to feed at the end of the day?

There must have been something about them they thought they needed – but what? It's not like the Doctor has the message 'I'm a mastermind alien' tattooed on his forehead.

"Though I'm afraid," the Doctor resumes, pushing for more information, "that you'll find Rose and I lack a little in expertise where warfare is concerned."

Clay looks at the Doctor in silence for a moment – still with that amused face.

 _Come on_ , the Doctor thinks, _give it to me straight. Why didn't you shoot us? Why didn't you finish the job when you had the numbers? What is it that made you feel you could use us?_

The possibility that Clay only spared them out of humaneness doesn't so much as cross the Doctor's mind. He's known, from the moment he looked into his eyes, that the man has killed before, and would again without blinking.

"Desperate times," he says. "We can always do with an extra pair of hands."

The Doctor nods. "Well, let us know when there's an opening for field work. No offense, but it looks like it can get a little smothering in here. Wouldn't say no to a little bit of fresh air."

"I know what you mean."

The Doctor gets on his feet.

He's seen enough here.

"Let me show you out. Oh," Clay adds just as his hand reaches the knob, "and if I can give you a piece of advice, I wouldn't go out wandering in the jungle anytime soon, if I were you. Not with your pretty friend in that state she's in. You being an Englishman, I don't expect you're too familiar with our environment, but just take my word for it that there's all sort of nasty things creeping and crawling out there. Things that'll know the smell of blood and be drawn to it. So," with another flash of his white grin, "I'd play it a little safer than that. But that's just me, right?"

"That's just you," the Doctor agrees.

…

Step after step in the dirty corridor. Green moss on the concrete walls. The Doctor's eyes wander to the ceiling, looking for air pipes. At night, if he and Rose can slip out of their room then maybe they can go through the ceiling, climb down the roof and make it back to the Tardis before Clay's people come looking for them.

And they will come looking for them.

That is clear to him, though why remains a mystery.

 _Really should have sat this one out when you had the chance_ , a voice taunts in his head. _If you weren't so afraid of asking yourself what would happen, with nothing to do, no great adventure to dive in head first, nothing but Rose and the Tardis sinking into infinity –_

"You're a coward," the Doctor says to himself, just as he reaches the right floor. "And if you weren't, Rose wouldn't have been shot."

Now's a little too late for self-pity.

Hopefully, he can redeem himself when they're back in the Tardis.

The room Clay's people gave them is at the extremity of a corridor, particularly unsavory, even for that building. The doors all lined up one after the other, too much like prison cells. Moss makes the floor slippery, and once a crunching sound causes the Doctor to look down and realize he's stepped on a roach, drawing attention to the myriad other crawlers that abound on the floor in passing.

This place is hardly more sanitary than the outside, he thinks – is part and parcel of the jungle rather than a haven from it.

But all thoughts are pushed out of his head with the violence of a tidal wave as he pushes open the door and finds the room empty.

"No," he says, before he can think, before he can analyze the situation –

The bed is unmade, and the breakfast tray he prepared for her has been at least nibbled.

"Jesus," he whispers. They should have established rules. "When we've been captured by a guerilla group, we don't go wandering about, we stay put."

To be fair, she probably wouldn't have left the room if she hadn't woken up to find him gone, first.

 _This one's on you again._

"I know, I know," he says.

And the door slams behind him as he starts retracing his steps.

…

 **End Notes** : I'd like to thank you all for your support. Reading about your reactions is one of the best parts of fanfiction-writing so please don't be shy and share your thoughts!


	6. Madhouse

To be clear, Rose knows the Doctor isn't going to like this. Of course not. Though he's not usually the kind who allows his concern to bring bounds on her freedom, she knows the circumstances are mitigating – he thought she might die, might have actually thought she _had_ died for a few seconds.

No, the Doctor has never been one to say, "Don't do that", "Too dangerous", "This you can't handle."

Rose believes it's precisely part of what made her fall in love with that world, his world, where she could do whatever the hell she wanted to –

"How is it kids put it these days?" She wonders. "Right. _The sky is the limit_."

But there's a strategy behind it.

Rose didn't just wake up from her latest doze thinking she'd give herself a tour into this nature-worn warehouse where they've landed.

Earlier, he told her he'd do the getting out of here, and she could focus on getting better, but that's without counting on a few things. For starters, she can only imagine from the still-frightening seriousness in his gaze how awfully dangerous he looked to the rebels when she got shot.

If these people are going to share their secrets with total strangers, who are they going to do it with?

Mr. dark-broody-eyes-that-want-to-kill-you, or the oh so clueless girl still bleeding out of her tummy?

And people in high school said she didn't put enough thought into things.

Playing clueless to get some clues out of people. Classic. And the Doctor is good at a lot of things, but looking clueless is not one of them.

So, when Rose runs into a twenty-something man, barely ten feet out of her bedroom, she breaks into a completely harmless smile as he sees her. His face reveals not exactly surprise, but a strange blank – like she's a rare creature he heard about, half feline half snake, and he's not sure how best to handle her.

But that's only for a flashing second – it lasts barely long enough for Rose to have time to make note of it or for her brain to register it's actually happened.

"Hey," he admonishes, with a now fully casual tone. "You're not supposed to be up."

"Aren't I?"

She shrugs her shoulders – goes for playful rather than suspicious. "Well, there's only so many hours a girl can sleep, right? I felt if I didn't stretch my legs, I was gonna go stark mad."

Rose's pulse is racketing for all her careless behavior – is he buying it, is he trying to read her, why did he react like this in the first place?

But then a saving thought spears through the confused mix. The idea that, right at this second, he's worried about her reading _him_ , and she knows she has to keep going, to blabber on and drown away the awkwardness before it has time to morph into hostility.

"Honestly, I'm just happy to be around other human beings you know. My friend and I, we – well, we really lost our way into that jungle out there, you know? I'm Rose," she adds.

As if he didn't know that.

She can't say why she finds it odd, that he knows who she is – has everybody in the building learned about them yet? How big even is this place, how many rebels are there? The team must be small enough that one unfamiliar face is a dead give-away, and yet –

Yet something isn't quite right.

"Well, I could use a little company myself," he says. "Has anyone given you the tour yet?"

"Can't say that they have."

"Unforgiveable."

He extends his hand toward her.

A sudden shiver of revulsion crawls down her spine.

She can't say why, exactly – only that the thought of taking that young man's hand, the same way she's taken the Doctor's countless times, fills her with dread.

( _We really shouldn't be here)_

 _(There's something wrong, very wrong about this place)_

Rose gives herself a mental slap and accepts the hand he gives her. She pushes for a smile, hoping it'll distract him from her split-second hesitation.

There might be hints on his face as to whether or not he noticed, but she can't see them.

But one way or the other, he's smiling back, and he looks happy enough with his find.

"Come," he says, "I'll show you around."

…

The Doctor mutters when he's nervous, words unintelligible enough that he doesn't worry about what they might give away.

"Walking around some warehouse in the middle of the jungle, just your regular vacation. Hi, I'm looking for a blond girl with mischief in her eyes and looks enough to drive you half mad, did you happen to see her around?"

Of course, the Doctor doesn't dare ask, doesn't trust anyone here enough to actually put himself out in the open.

But somehow, this isn't just about Rose walking off without warnings.

It's about what it means, for him, in the greater picture. For eternity.

 _You've lost girls before, friends, companions, lovers._

 _You've lost them and you've kept going – what else can you do – but if you lose this one, if you lose her –_

"I'll go stark mad," the Doctor says to himself. "Mad as a hatter."

Looking for the blond girl in blue who got lost wandering about Wonderland.

"Rose, darling, you're late, for a very important –"

The thoughts are brought to a halt as the Doctor finally stumbles open the right door, at the right time.

He knows it's her right from the start, as the flash of her blond hair beckons his eye, and he pries the door open wider, ignoring the odd resistance he encounters.

"Now, wait a second –"

Before he's got time to heed the warning, the Doctor hears a crystalline clatter as the chain that was meant to keep the door closed gives way under his determination. Next thing he knows, the door is wide open, and pretty metal links are scattered at his feet.

It must have been a weak chain.

The Doctor isn't that strong, not in that body. This scrawny dark-haired shape might have the looks, in terms of sheer strength, he's known better days.

"Great. Now you've broken it."

In the room, there are four boys – boyish men at best – all about Rose's age, apparently playing a game of pool for her entertainment.

She herself can't play, they must have decided, with that wound in her tummy.

The Doctor catches immediately how puffed up they are, each going their most Alpha male on him, which gives him the odd, disturbing sensation that he's walked in on a sort of mating ritual.

 _Just guys playing pool_ , he jams the thought in, because this is no time to get angry.

"Relax guys," Rose says, cleverly coaxing. "That's just my friend."

"Your friend broke the security chain."

 _Why was the door locked in the first place?_

The question on the tip of his tongue, unasked, unanswered.

Rose shrugs her shoulders. Oh, how he loves her when she outsmarts him. He said they had to be political, and here she is, playing the game, while he's making a mess of things.

"Well, it mustn't have been too strong if my friend could break it, could it?"

Her remark seems to appease the young men.

They are younger and, yes, apparently stronger than he is.

Of course, Rose isn't out there actually having fun with these people.

She's just trying to survive – getting into their heads. Gaining their trust.

Clever, clever girl.

The Doctor hears these days smart is the new sexy – and he'll be damned if it isn't.

"No need to worry, boys," he says, with a mock casual tone – he still can't get over why the door was locked, can't quite unflex his fingers that make up tight fists, which he decides to hide in the pockets of his trousers. "I was just curious where my friend had disappeared."

"That's just like me, isn't it, to go wandering about when my stiches have just been fixed?"

She jokes, but her eyes are alert, and not amused in the slightest.

Playing the game, she turns to the boys, as if they've got some sort of complicit bond between them, as if she's keeping the Doctor away.

She says, "I love to give him a good scare."

It's working.

Slowly, the boys relax, go on chuckling, and one of them actually goes back to that game of pool, showing off the muscles of his arms, the sleeves of his tee-shirt rolled up to his shoulders.

"Aren't you a bit old to be her boyfriend anyway?"

"Now, now, I don't discriminate." Rose says – almost her regular teasing tone.

 _My_ , the Doctor thinks, _she's a good actress_.

"He's not my boyfriend," she adds, looking at the game of pool, looking at her fingernails she polished just before they landed in this jungle. Looking at everything and nothing, except the Doctor.

"Don't you do boyfriends in England?"

"Sure."

"Not that it isn't swell," the Doctor says, scanning the room with his eyes, "that you guys here have a little fun-house just to yourself, but I do think you've been on your feet long enough for one day."

A look of understanding passes between he and Rose.

Let him play the bad guy, the overprotective dad-friend, while she still works on getting them to trust her. Though the Doctor hates nothing more than to be a killjoy, this is one party he'd sooner cut short.

( _Why was that door locked?_ )

And, he sees this clear as day in Rose's keen gaze, she was aware of the danger, was just trying to infiltrate the wolf pack and howl along, which seems to have been working out well enough for her.

"Right now?" Plaintive shrillness in her voice.

He's played it like the stern father, and she's playing it like the rebellious teenager.

The Doctor doesn't like it but he started it, so there goes any objection.

He shrugs his shoulders. Apologetic but firm, "The doc said you needed rest. C'mon, Rose. It's not like we're going anywhere. You can play with your new friends later."

She shoots a warning look at him.

Did he push it too far?

Acting human is such hard work.

They don't ask for permission. The Doctor would sooner act like they're still in control, doesn't want to give those boys an opportunity to challenge him.

Rose casts them a mock regretful look when the Doctor takes her by the hand and leads her out of the room.

The youthfulness and flirt drain from her face as they walk side by side, alone in the corridor. In the blink of an eye, she's transformed from a twenty-some girl brightly beaming with inexperienced glee, to a full-blown woman, a woman who's not old, but who's seen the end of the world, who's watched empires rise and fall, who's travelled from one end of the universe to another.

For the first time, it truly enters the Doctor's mind, that by giving her all that, he's actually taken something from her.

What? Her childhood?

He nearly wishes he was still enough of a romantic to think like this.

"You can play with your new friends later. Really?" She says, decides to make fun of his performance will help restore balance in her adrenalin-pumped chest. "It's like I'm five years old and you're dragging me out of the sandbox."

"Sorry. My humanness wants practice."

"Not all of it."

"I don't like these boys, Rose. Or any of it."

He thinks of the locked door again but doesn't mention it.

"Well, I'm not the hugest fan of that place either. Just killing time before you make me queen of the world, remember?"

Of course, there's a bigger picture. She didn't actually get out of that room to give him a scare or because she was bored.

After a small exhale, it comes out.

"I don't know if you've exactly noticed this, Sherlock, but these people don't trust you."

"Uh."

"They don't _want_ to trust you. Why should they? You're a foreigner who just happened to be wandering into their war zone, you call yourself Doctor but you don't actually perform surgeries."

"You, on the other hand?"

She shrugs, like it's that easy. Like, at the height of her twenty years, she's had time to understand the world better than him in some respects.

"I'm a girl. I'm young. I'm pretty." She shakes her head, amused. "And I actually know how to play into their game. What I mean is they're less likely to see me as a threat than you. After all, I did come into this place unconscious and badly wounded. Totally harmless. The damsel in distress."

"Okay, yeah."

But he doesn't like what she's saying, even so.

Actually, it's the first thing she's said that plays back into his head –

 _I'm a girl_.

The only girl the Doctor has seen here, he realizes.

Probably a coincidence. Not like he's been introduced to everyone here.

But he doesn't like this.

He doesn't.

"We need to get out of here," he says.

"You're preaching the choir."

"I mean _fast_."

He catches her forearm and she pivots, meets his eyes with startle.

"You said we needed a plan."

"I know."

But he's seen a little bit more of this place, in the past few hours, enough to reflect that a long-winded, well-thought out plan of action might not be so useful to them after all.

Carefully, the Doctor inspects their surroundings for any prying eyes or ears and looks back at Rose when he's satisfied himself that they're not being spied on.

"Have you seen these people, Rose? They're not at war. I've been in the midst of a few, too many, and I can tell you that that's not what the heart of warfare looks like."

"What are you saying?"

"These people haven't been fighting for a long time. Out there, in the jungle, when they shot you – they weren't fighting either, Rose. They were hunting."

"Okay." She nods, serious as well. "Trying to catch what?"

He shakes his head. "All I know is everything they've told us is a pack of lies. Every one of them is playing make-believe with us. It's only a matter of time before the whole pretense falls apart – they must know that."

Rose swallows. "Which is why we need to get out of here." She repeats with more understanding. "Fast."

"Faster than they expect. Before they've realized we're on to something. You've been hurt, and you haven't taken their meds. I don't think they think we'll be crazy enough to take our chances with the jungle so suddenly."

Rose smiles, and the surprise of it cuts into him –

 _That smile of hers could stop a revolution_ , he thinks. _It could probably start one_.

Hell. It's starting one right now, inside of him.

"Are we?"

She arches a brow.

He wants to say, _Stop. Rose, stop playing with me_.

 _We haven't got time. We're talking life and death here_.

"What?"

She says, "Crazy."

He sighs a little. "Rose."

"I know, I know. There's more urgent things to think of – aren't there always?" She teases, like she knows all about his secret flight, how he runs from her, all the time, even while he would do everything in his power to keep her by his side.

Everything, really.

He sometimes thinks he would even break the laws of the time lords – collapse the whole universe.

But that's just selfishness speaking, of course.

He and this girl are just specks of dust on the gargantuan structure of history, and naturally he couldn't jeopardize this bigger picture out of affection, that'd be criminal, it would be –

 _Crazy_.

"Right," he says, instead.

She shrugs. Has that capacity to rebound that seems to him the crystallization of youth. "So, we get out. Right now. First door we see."

"Well –"

"Don't act like I'm being impulsive here. There's something funny about this place, I can feel it – and not the fun funny either. The I smell a rat funny."

"I couldn't agree more."

"What do you say, then? Sneak away like thieves?"

The Doctor makes a fast appraisal of the situation. How long can Rose keep a fast-walking pace with that wound, nearly untreated? How long can she go on without food? She did barely nibble that breakfast.

"Well?"

"I'm thinking."

The knuckles he's pressed to his forehead show that he's not kidding.

"Tonight," he says finally, looking up at her. "You'll go upstairs and rest for what's left of the day. Please, Rose," he insists when she opens her mouth. "This is going to be no picnic. It took us hours to get to this warehouse, without a guide it'll probably take more for us to go back to the Tardis. You're going to need all the strength you can get."

A sparkle in her eyes as she investigates him. He's spoken the truth… but not all of it.

What he doesn't add is, he doesn't want to be worrying about where she is and who she's with. The pool-playing boys flash in his head once again, he likes them less every time it happens.

"What about you?"

"I'll try to get my hands on some supplies."

"And?"

"Decide where we'll escape from," he shrugs. "Probably, there won't be an ideal way. Good plans take time, and time's what we're short of right now."

"So, they'll be right at our heels," Rose says, "provided they decide we're worth chasing."

"We're worth chasing." He can't say why that is just yet.

Not quite.

But he can see in her grave beaming eyes that though she can't say it, either, she senses it too.

"Just one little run," she says, "and we'll be back in the Tardis getting foot massages?"

He supposes that means he'll be the one doing the massaging. Fair enough. He did promise her the universe.

But she's put it with enough uncertainty that he just says again, "Tonight."

…

 **End Notes** : I am really getting more involved into this story. Can't get enough of that pairing… Please share your thoughts in the comment section! Take care!


	7. Now

Rose remembers her old life like a dream now, whose tasteless substance is one homogeneous whole, like those bowls of porridge her mother used to feed her for breakfast when she was young. It's not that she _means_ to condescend dear old planet earth or the early 2000s. There's worse jobs than working in a shop, and there's definitely worse cities to live in than London.

But Jesus, how it used to bore her. Removing price tags and bagging items and _Have a nice day yourself, luv_ , though she wasn't aware of just how sick of it she was until a man (who was not a man) took her by the hand and, in a second, the world before her glimmered like polished gems fresh from the heavens, and there was no limit higher than she chose to place it.

Anyway. What she's getting to is she keeps thinking of that goal fashionable for people her age to talk about, back in the days, and it was all about _living in the now_.

Now, it's ridiculous to think that, back then, Rose could have had the slightest idea what it meant. But it was hard. That much she knows. Smiling to customers and unpacking the latest deliveries in the back, she was never actually _there_ , her mind clawing at fragments from have-beens or would-bes, and that just seemed normal, everyday stuff.

Honestly. It wasn't until she felt she might die, might _really_ die, that Rose learned what _living in the now_ means.

It's not just the danger, though it's part of it.

When you're standing before the Virgin Queen or watching as the earth disintegrates from a spaceship, where else are you going to be, what else are you going to think about, that there's still yesterday's washing-up to do or that you need to be grocery shopping?

Her mom thinks she's crazy, but Rose thinks you would need to have _been_ crazy to go back to living your old life –

As if you could pick up from where you left off, anyway, and not outright _die_ from the pointlessness of it.

"Christ!"

Rose lets out when her ankle gets caught in a root protruding from the ground and she lands on her knees, dry grass scraping the already-reddened skin of her bare calves.

She didn't even use to swear like that.

The Doctor says she picked it up from Churchill.

"Come on."

He lifts her up by the shoulders and they keep running – or rather, trotting, which is the best that she can manage without doing too much damage to her stitches.

"Did we lose them?" Rose says, but knows it's like throwing a net in the sky trying to catch the moon. The idea itself brings hope, the undertaking is hopeless.

"Not yet." The Doctor grunts when he hoists her weight around his shoulder. "I'd be lying if I said I wasn't wishing we'd get a little more of a head start. But desperate times and all that."

Rose doesn't answer.

His ability to sound casual in the face of danger no longer impresses her –

Though it'd be useless to deny it _seduces_ her a little.

Why is it the Doctor never turns into an ugly old man, she thinks.

Then, she reckons, maybe he does.

And probably, it would make no difference.

What thrills her has nothing to do with the features of his face – bless her, she'd be incapable of even saying whether he's handsome.

It's that gleam that burns out of his eyes when he looks at her, that gleam that looks almost – _crazy_. The indescribable heat that rushes through her when he takes her by the hand.

Inimitable.

 _Timeless_.

"Wait."

The Doctor's hands are around her waist, suddenly, as he draws her through an especially bushy stretch until they're both under cover, behind a tree.

The bark feels rough against the bare skin of her shoulders. Now, they've stopped, and she can't ignore how exhausted she is, gasps in all the oxygen she can. And in the jungle, it tastes so thick, so much like sap and earth and all the life that teems beneath the high grass, it makes her head spin a little.

How could she forget that she lives in the _now_ , now that she can taste it?

"What?" She asks, but the Doctor presses a finger to his mouth, cautions silence.

Rose swallows, can't chase the dryness in her throat.

He hasn't removed his hand from her waist, and he's so close, she isn't sure which is most intoxicating – the smell of the jungle, or his.

Time comes to a standstill.

Rose sees no further than the stretch of each second, thinks of nothing but the eyes before her that open onto abysses, deep as only the infinity of space can suggest.

Whatever it is the Doctor hears, she hasn't caught it.

"Is it them?" She speaks so low, only he could make out the words on her lips.

He shakes his head. "I don't know," he says. "In places like this, there's more than one type of predator running about."

"Maybe you should kiss me."

The look in his eyes darkens – _smolders_ , just for a second, until he chases it away with admonishment.

"It works in the movies," she smiles, "when the heroes are running away from someone, trying not to get noticed."

He doesn't say that's absurd, doesn't play the obtuse card.

In fact – and her pulse starts throbbing at the thought alone – for a second there, she really thinks he might.

Kiss her.

If they weren't running away from a group of revolutionaries, in the middle of the jungle. If there wasn't such a great danger lurking about.

But where does he ever take her that doesn't come with a 'great danger' package?

Will the next journey be safer – will he allow himself to stop running from the _real_ danger?

The danger he's only ever voiced to her once.

 _You can spend the rest of your life with me, Rose. But I can never spend mine with yours._

Will he stop running, when they're out of this place?

If not _now_ , when?

"Don't," he whispers, but his eyes are black and so serious, it stops her smiling immediately. "You're injured. There's bad people after us, I need to get us back to the Tardis. I can't let you distract me."

His blunt honesty surprises her so, she almost laughs.

Almost.

A split second later, she hears the rustling of movement in the branches, and when she looks aside, right next to the tree they're leaning against, she sees eyes of a pure yellow, eyes that glide over her, with lazy interest, as the jaguar draws closer, its paws buried into the high grass, its golden fur shimmering here and there where the moonbeams penetrate the ceiling of leaves above their heads.

Rose and the Doctor stand absolutely still.

 _I'm bleeding_ , Rose thinks. _He can smell me_.

All she can do is pray for him not to be hungry.

Rose can't say how long it lasts. There's no distance, no possibility to take a step back and think of counting the minutes.

Ultimately, the jaguar pads elegantly away, and vanishes into the night as suddenly as he pierced it with his terrifying beauty.

Rose looks back at the Doctor and breathes.

It strikes her she mustn't have been breathing at all, for however long that moment lasted. The Doctor joins her with a loud exhale and their hoarse breathing breaks into laughter.

For just a second, his thoughts hold no secrets from her, and she can see right through the usually undecipherable walls of his eyes.

She can see all the things he tells himself to keep control.

That she's only one among many. He's known others like her. Loved others. All so he can think that it won't destroy him to lose her.

He had already lost everything when he met her.

Now –

Now, she can see it, as he tosses away the lies, the excuses he uses to keep her away.

"About that kiss."

Heat pools down the pit of her stomach.

But the wind turns, carrying the sound of men marching from afar, and she knows they're still far away from the Tardis – and they need to get back to it before these men can get to _them_.

"I know," she says, reads the look on his face. "Put a pin on it."

His fingers brush away from her waist, and they start running again.

He holds her hand.

And they ride the night together, their limbs flying into the hot taste of the air.

How many miles away, how many _centuries_ away from home is she?

Rose knows immediately that she doesn't care.

At this point, what does _now_ even mean?


End file.
